


oranges taste like losing hope, strawberries taste like finding it again

by kodzukat



Series: this is just a bump in the road [1]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Hospitalization, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Overdosing, Self-Harm, Suicide Attempt, Vomiting, Yamaguchi Tadashi Needs a Hug, Yamaguchi Tadashi-centric, but the ending is cute, no its not beta read, this is sad im sorry, vent fic? more likely than u think
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-16
Updated: 2020-10-16
Packaged: 2021-03-09 04:42:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,857
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27038914
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kodzukat/pseuds/kodzukat
Summary: Tadashi comes to hate oranges but love strawberries.ORTadashi attempts suicide and doesn't tell anyone, but Kei shows up at the hospital and lets him know that he's not alone.
Relationships: Tsukishima Kei/Yamaguchi Tadashi
Series: this is just a bump in the road [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1979390
Comments: 11
Kudos: 273





	oranges taste like losing hope, strawberries taste like finding it again

**Author's Note:**

> tw; everything in the tags!!! but also depictions of treatment of overdoses. please do not read further if you think that any of the things tagged will upset you, otherwise, enjoy reading :)

Tadashi can’t smell anything.

When he first entered the emergency room earlier that night, he was ambushed by the smell of disinfectant, he could feel how hard it was trying to neutralize the sorrow that consumed the hospital wing. After crying for two hours, Tadashi’s nose is blocked, his sense of smell hindered.

Tadashi can still see through the blurry pane of his tears, but he’s been staring at the same white aluminum ceiling for so long that he’s forgotten what anything else looks like. His hearing is intact as well, but everything sounds muffled. _Everyone’s just far away_ , he thinks, but he can hardly even make out the words that his mother, who’s sat on a chair next to his bed, says as she holds his cold hand in her warm one.

One sense of Tadashi’s that works too well for his liking is that of taste. He can still taste the vile liquid that had saved his life earlier and he can’t decide if it was worse going down or coming up.

He closes his eyes and relives it all for the umpteenth time.

* * *

Tadashi sat still on his bed after taking a large handful of painkillers. They had tasted sickeningly sweet sliding down his throat, and his hands were still stained red because he had held the pills in his sweaty grasp for too long. His heartbeat was increasing rapidly and his hands began to shake as the severity of his actions caught up with him. _Do I want to die?_

He figured that his uncertainty would expire in a few minutes, so he made his way to the bathroom to tend to the large gash on his forearm which was caked with dry blood.

The bottle of rubbing alcohol on the bathroom counter toppled over as he tried to grab it with trembling hands. Its contents flooded into the sink as the weakly-fastened cap popped off, the scent stung Tadashi’s nostrils and tears immediately flooded his eyes. He wanted to believe that the alcohol’s fumes stung them too, but when he caught an image of himself in the mirror, clutching the sink and weeping in complete frustration, he knew that was a lie.

 _Do I want to die?_ He still had no idea. _But I’ve made it too far to go back now, right?_

His weeps turned into body-wracking sobs. He couldn’t look at himself anymore, the sight of his reflection only made his tears pour down faster. Sharp pain overtook his wounded arm as a result of the pressure he was putting on it to keep himself standing, so he released his grip on the sink and let his tremulant frame fall to the floor.

Tadashi heard footsteps approaching the bathroom. He didn't bother trying to conceal the pathetic state he was in, she’d see through his act anyway.

The door which he sat adjacent to opened only slightly and a soft voice flowed into the room. “Tadashi, are you crying?”

His bawling only grew louder upon being spoken to so gently. Guilt burned him alive. It was a flame set in the depths of his heart that spread through his limbs, painfully igniting his nerves until he felt nothing but shame. “Mom, I did something bad,” he choked out through his tears.

His mother’s eyes were drawn to the cut on his arm as soon as she entered the room. Tadashi could tell how carefully she was trying to maintain her warm gaze, but he recognized the panic in her eyes. It was the same panic he’d see in his own whenever he caught a glimpse of his reflection in a bus window on the way to a big game. They shared the same countenance, and it often betrayed both of them, they could read each other with ease.

She approached him slowly as he continued wailing. “Tadashi, your cut’s already dry,” she mumbled. “Don’t you remember what I told you last time? You have to clean it before it gets infected.” Her voice threatened to crack as she kneeled down next to the crying boy and placed a hand on his shoulder, pitifully attempting to provide solace.

Tadashi slumped against his mother as soon as she was within reach, clutching the back of her thick robe violently with his unsteady hands and burying his tear-soaked face in her chest. She smelled like lemons and eucalyptus, but only a hint of her scent was tangible amidst the malodor of alcohol that enveloped the room.

She rubbed circles into his back, her hands were trembling, too. “Honey, the pharmacy closes in an hour. We should buy more alcohol so we can clean your cut.”

“Mom,” he whimpered against her chest, “I did something really bad.” His words were chopped up between coughs and labored breaths. “Please, don’t be mad.”

“You can tell me what happened. I promise I won’t be mad.”

“I took a lot of pills,” he sobbed. It was muffled by the plush fabric of her robe. “I took too many pills.”

He felt his mother’s heart rate speed up against his cheek as her breath caught in her throat. He didn’t want to see her face.

* * *

It was apparent to Tadashi that his mother was holding back tears as she rushed him into the car. He sat hunched over in the backseat, finally able to put a pause to his crying, and she bombarded him with questions while driving them speedily to the hospital. He was sure that she was exceeding the speed limit, but he knew better than to critique her driving at such a time.

“What did you take?”

“How many did you take?”

“How long has it been since you took them?”

“Did you try making yourself vomit?”

His answers to all of these questions seemed to make her face fall, but he should have known that the act of overdosing in itself would disappoint her.

The drive only took ten minutes according to the clock on the car’s dashboard, but it felt at least three times as long. It was past midnight, so all Tadashi could see through the window was lampposts, traffic lights, and the light-up signs of a few stores that were still open. It didn’t matter, he couldn’t focus on them anyway.

After sticking an IV tube in his hand upon arrival and putting him in a hospital gown, a couple of nurses in the emergency room asked him the same questions that his mother had. They also seemed just as disappointed with his answers as his mother had been. His head was spinning, the room was too white, and he had no idea that he was supposed to make himself throw up, but he figured that it would be pretty easy with his stomach already churning from anxiety.

He and his mother were left alone for a while, but technically they still had company. Until some vacancies appeared in the main ward, Tadashi would stay in the emergency wing. He sat on a hospital bed which was only separated from others by curtains, and he faced parallel to the waiting room.

A short nurse with brown hair and kind eyes entered his “room.” She held a large bottle containing murky black liquid in one hand, and in the other, she held a small plastic cup. “Yamaguchi-kun, please drink this,” she said as she began pouring the liquid into the cup.

Tadashi took the cup cautiously. He looked into the dark concoction and frowned. “What is this?”

The nurse gave him a sympathetic smile. “It’s activated charcoal. It’ll prevent your stomach from absorbing the paracetamol you took,” she explained as she made sure his IV tube was positioned correctly. “You have to drink it quickly, though, because it only works one hour after the poisoning, and according to what you told us it’s already been forty-five minutes since you overdosed.”

Tadashi brought the cup to his nose and sniffed its contents, they were odorless. _If it doesn't stink it should taste fine._

After swallowing his first sip, Tadashi was gasping for air and coughing hysterically. Despite being mixed with water, the black powder didn’t dissolve in the slightest, and it left his mouth dry. It tasted the way he imagined cement would and it felt like chalk on his tongue. He knew it would be torture to drink the rest slowly, so he gulped it down in one mouthful, although he wasn’t so sure that was any better after doing so.

He handed the plastic cup back to the nurse who gave him an apologetic glance as she refilled it from the large bottle. He had to drink the whole thing.

* * *

Half an hour after downing the charcoal, Tadashi was given a small plastic bottle filled with orange liquid by the same nurse from before. “You'll be taking this regularly over the next three days to lower the levels of paracetamol in your bloodstream. Hopefully it will prevent long-term liver damage,” she said as she held out the bottle. “But don't worry, only the first dose is this big.”

The medicine mildly resembled orange juice, but it was both revoltingly sweet and painfully tangy, like a horribly made orange candy. Tadashi winced as he chugged it, he grew to hate oranges more and more with each gulp.

For the next hour, Tadashi’s body was seized by dizzying nausea. His mother told him to try sleeping but laying down only made the bile in his throat rise up faster. Saliva pooled in his mouth every few seconds, he’d swallow it down hard. The queasiness was so agonizing that it nearly brought tears to his eyes, and for the first time in his life, he wanted to throw up just to put an end to the sick waiting game.

Throwing up was so much worse than he had expected it to be.

Tadashi had thrown up before, but never so much at once, and never such a putrid flavor. The two disgusting solutions he had drunk earlier were mingled together in his stomach and came out with bile trailing them. His vomit was black, it tasted like cement and synthetic orange, and it seemed to never end.

He screwed his eyes shut as he continued emitting his stomach’s contents into a bucket that the nurse had given him. He felt his mother’s fingers stroke his hair delicately and he heard the curtains which closed his bed off from the rest of the emergency room being drawn to give him privacy. Tadashi cried for the first time since arriving at the hospital. He felt pathetic.

* * *

Thirty-nine hours later, Tadashi isn’t as overwhelmed.

He despises the orange medicine that he has to take every few hours, but he can manage it in small doses. At first, he feared that it would make him throw up every time he took it, but he later found out that was the work of the charcoal cleaning out his system.

He’s been moved to his own hospital room, so he doesn’t have to live in the emergency wing among other people for the rest of his stay, which is a relief. What’s not as much of a relief is that he has to stay in the pediatric ward because he’s still two weeks shy of eighteen, and can’t be left alone without adult supervision. He thinks that's ridiculous, but at least he can cry without anyone but his mom hearing him and turn the lights off at night.

Tadashi peers through the window next to his hospital bed. He doesn’t have much of a view, it’s just buildings in various shades of beige and grey, but the warmth of the afternoon sun makes his chest feel lighter. 

He picks up his phone to check the time but avoids looking at any notifications. _4:30_. His friends are getting out of classes right now, volleyball practice is starting.

One of the nurses who'd been looking after Tadashi knocks on the door before entering his room. He just took his medicine fifteen minutes ago, so he assumes that she’s here to draw blood or check his vitals. “Yamaguchi-kun,” she says with a smile, “you have a visitor.”

 _What? That’s impossible?_ Tadashi hasn’t told anyone that he’s in the hospital, he hasn’t even answered any of the texts he’s received asking why he hasn’t been at school. His mother called into the office and said that he had a fever to excuse his absences. He considers the possibility that she told a relative about what happened and they’re here to visit him, maybe his aunt or his grandmother, but that doesn't make him feel any better. He throws a panicked glance in his mother’s direction which she returns with a small smile. 

His heart is hammering so hard in his chest that he thinks it might burst through his ribcage and his palms are clammy with sweat. He gulps. “Who is it?” he asks, voice quivering and barely audible.

The nurse takes a quick look at her clipboard before answering. “Tsukishima Kei.”

Tadashi’s eyes widen in horror. He feels like he has been punched in the stomach and the air has been knocked out of his lungs. Time has stopped, he can’t form a coherent sentence. He faces his mother again, she gives a small nod. 

“Okay,” is all Tadashi can manage to say. The nurse asks his mother for clarification before taking his response as acceptance of the visitor.

The nurse leaves briefly, but only to come back with Kei in tow. The taller boy looks disheveled. He’s out of breath, and both his hair and his uniform are messy. _Did he run here from school? That would be surprising._ He’s carrying his red school bag on his shoulder, and Tadashi notices that his neck is bare, he’s not wearing his headphones.

Kei greets Tadashi’s mother succinctly before taking her place in a chair across from his best friend once she leaves the room. Tadashi can’t decide if he’s grateful for or resentful of the fact that Kei turned eighteen a month ago and counts as his “adult supervision.”

The two sit in silence for a few minutes, but it’s not the comfortable silence that they’re used to; the silence where Kei listens to music and Tadashi hums his own melodies as they walk home together from volleyball practice. It’s an awkward silence, save for the pounding of Tadashi’s heart, which he’s sure Kei can hear. He really wishes the older boy had brought his headphones.

Tadashi feels far too aware of his appearance. He hasn’t been able to shower in nearly two days, so his brown hair is oily and matted. He’s been stuck in this room for the majority of his stay, so not only does he smell but so does the room. He feels gross, he’s overcome by a wave of shame. He wants to shrink himself down as tiny as possible and disappear.

Kei, who’s picking at the skin around his nails, opens his mouth to say something, but closes it quickly. Tadashi can tell that he’s thinking intently about his words, it makes him feel uneasy.

“Aren’t you supposed to be at volleyball practice?” Tadashi mumbles, eyes focused on his hands resting in his lap.

Tadashi hears an exasperated sigh. “What the fuck, Yamaguchi?” Kei exclaims. “How am I supposed to go to volleyball practice after finding out you're in the hospital two days after you’ve been admitted?”

Tadashi didn’t think he could feel any more anxious, but now his throat is tightening and he’s forgotten how to breathe. The last thing he wanted was to worry anyone, especially his best friend, that’s why he didn’t say anything. He keeps his gaze lowered, terrified by the anger that might be plastered across Kei’s face. “How did you find out?”

“Our teacher said that you had a fever,” Kei replies calmly. “That was fine, but you weren’t replying to my texts, which was strange. I called your mom because I was worried, she told me.”

The tension that was seizing Tadashi’s muscles eases with Kei’s change in tone. His heart skips a beat, but it’s not an anxious rhythm this time. It doesn’t shock him that Kei was worried after hearing that he was in the hospital, but it is pleasantly surprising to know that his friend, who doesn’t usually concern himself with other people, was worried enough about him to ask his mother what had happened to him.

Tadashi feels guilty for taking comfort in Kei’s distress. He knows that he’s made his friend anxious, and it’s possible that he’s even severed the trust between them by not disclosing his situation. He realizes where their conversation is headed. “Did she tell you what happened?”

“No,” Kei responds curtly. “She said she’d leave that to you.”

Tadashi looks up towards Kei, who is still picking at his fingers. Usually, Tadashi would take his hand and tell him to stop irritating his skin, but he’ll let his friend have his coping mechanism just this once. “Tsukki, I don’t want you to hate me.” He says it so softly that it’s almost a whisper.

Kei’s eyes are filled with alarm. “Why would I hate you?”

“I did something bad,” Tadashi mumbles.

“Like what?” Kei questions. “Drugs?” 

Tadashi appreciates his friend trying to lighten the mood with his snarky disposition, even though he can tell that it’s forced. He chuckles, his first laugh in the past forty hours. “Kind of.”

Kei cocks an eyebrow. “Kind of?”

Tadashi takes a deep breath. He looks into Kei’s eyes in an attempt to read his emotions, but all he can see is pleading. He’s trapped. He knows that he can’t dance around the subject any longer. “I overdosed on painkillers.”

They’re shrouded in silence again. This time it’s painful.

Kei breaks it clumsily. “Why didn’t you tell me you were thinking about doing that?” He’s scowling and there’s a trace of venom in his voice.

Tadashi is scared. He’s scared that he’s made his best friend, the person he cares about most, hate him. He wants to cry, but he doesn’t deserve to wallow in sadness after doing something so horrible to someone else. “I’m sorry, Tsukki,” he whispers. “I didn’t really know what was happening until it… happened.”

“What?”

“I’ve wanted to die for a while, but I’d never really thought killing myself through. I didn’t have a plan. That night I was tired and frustrated, so I took the pills without thinking. I regretted it right away.”

Kei’s face doesn’t soften, but his hostile expression fades. “You could’ve told me you felt that way.”

Tadashi’s eyes sting with tears that threaten to fall. He brings a hand up to wipe them away before they can escape. “I didn’t think you’d understand.”

Kei moves his chair closer to the side of the bed. Now within reach of Tadashi, he takes the younger boy’s hand in his own. Tadashi’s chest feels light, the way it does when he’s watching the sun in the afternoon. He knows he’s blushing profusely, so he keeps his chin down.

“Yamaguchi,” Kei says in the gentlest tone that Tadashi has ever heard him use, “look at me.”

Tadashi brings his eyes to meet Kei’s, earnest and compassionate behind his glasses. He can no longer tell if his irregular heartbeat is the result of anxiety or yearning. He’s never seen his best friend with such a sentimental air around him. Kei’s stone-faced propensity has never bothered Tadashi, he’s always loved him nonetheless, but seeing a side of his best friend that cares for him makes his heart swell.

“I know that I’m the last person anyone would ever want to talk to about their mental health,” Kei begins, still holding Tadashi’s hand, “but I don’t want to lose you just because I’m emotionally inept.” Despite the serious circumstances, he still finds a way to poke fun at himself, it makes Tadashi smile. “I may not always understand how you’re feeling but I’ll always listen. I’ll help in any way I can.”

“Tsukki,” Tadashi whimpers. His eyes well up with tears again and his bottom lip quivers. His voice serves as a warning that he’s about to cry. “I wouldn’t wanna bother you with my problems all the time.”

Kei lets out a breathy laugh and gently rubs circles into the back of Tadashi’s hand with his thumb. “I’d rather constantly hear about your problems than never hear from you again.”

Tadashi pulls his hand away from Kei’s and buries his face in his palms. His IV tube rests at an odd angle, but he ignores the discomfort. He’s embarrassed by the sob forming in his chest and the tears running down his cheeks over mere words of support. Not only that, but his face is so hot that he knows it’s burning red.

Kei sighs. “Come on, Yamaguchi, I’ve seen you cry before,” he chides, “no need to be ashamed.” 

Tadashi lowers his hands, but not without an indignant grunt. Kei tilts his head to the side, eyebrows furrowed in deep concentration.

“What’s wrong?” Tadashi stammers.

Kei adjusts his glasses to sit on the bridge of his nose. “Your face looks like a strawberry when it’s red,” he muses with a smirk.

“A strawberry?”

“Yeah, a strawberry,” Kei replies sincerely. “It’s red and your freckles look like seeds.”

Tadashi lets out a laugh, but it gets caught in a sob. Kei gives a sad smile which falls as soon as his attention is transferred to a wad of bandages wrapped around Tadashi’s forearm. He runs a finger over the rough gauze. “What happened?”

“Cut,” Tadashi mumbles while avoiding eye contact. “It’s not the first time, but I’m usually more discreet.”

Kei withdraws his hand and nods slowly. “Let me know whenever you feel like doing that,” he says assuringly. “I can tell you enough facts about dinosaurs to make you forget what was even upsetting you in the first place.”

Tadashi grins. His eyes linger over Kei’s features for far too long; his wavy blond hair, his honey-hued eyes, his hardly-there smile. His heart pounds in his chest, and he can’t breathe, but it feels nice this time.

Almost instinctively, Tadashi places a kiss on Kei’s cheek. It’s only a peck, so quick that it’s over before Tadashi even recognizes what he’s done, but it’s long enough for him to relish in how soft Kei’s skin feels against his lips. 

His eyes widen with realization once he’s come down from his Kei-induced high, and he’s a trembling, stuttering mess. “Is that okay?” he blurts out, anxiously awaiting Kei’s reaction.

Kei’s expression is unchanged, he simply nods. “It’s okay,” he answers, “but your lips are dry.”

Tadashi huffs, unsure whether he should be relieved or offended. “That's what hours of crying does,” he retorts with a pout.

Kei rummages through his bag, beaming once he’s found what he’s looking for. He hands Tadashi a pink tube of lip balm.

Tadashi takes the tube reluctantly, hesitant to admit defeat, and applies some of the product to his lips.

It tastes like strawberries.

**Author's Note:**

> you've reached the end!!! thank you so much for reading, i really hope you enjoyed this. i had a kuroken coffee shop au that i was working on for over a week but i dropped it and wrote + edited this in under 20 hours instead. sometimes inspiration just hits you...


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